Higher Lessons in English by Alonzo Reed and Brainerd Kellogg (popular books to read TXT) 📕

very useful in slurring over the less important actions that the more important may have prominence. Show that they are so used in Franklin’s narrative.

Examine the phrase with a roll under each arm, and eating the other, and see if you do not find an illustration of the fact that even great men sometimes make slips. Does other properly mean one of three things? Try to improve this expression.

+The Grouping of Sentences into Paragraphs+.—The sentences above, as you see, stand in two groups. Those of each group are more closely related to one another than they are to the sentences of the other group. Do you see how? In studying this short selection you may find the general topic, or heading, to be something like this: My First Experiences in Philadelphia. Now examine the first group of sentences and see whether its topic might not be put thus: My Condition on Reaching Philadelphia. Then examine the sentences of the second group and see whether all will not come under this heading: How I Found Something to Eat. You see that even a short composition like this has a general topic with topics under it. As sub means under, we will call these under topics subtopics. There are two groups of sentences in this selection because there are two distinct subtopics developed. The sentences of each group stand together because they jointly develop one subtopic.

A group of sentences related and held together by a common thought we call a +Paragraph+. How is the paragraph indicated to the eye? What help is it to the reader to have a composition paragraphed? What, to the writer to know that he must write in paragraphs?

+The Style of the Author+.—This selection is mainly +Narrative+. The matter is somewhat tame, and the expression is commonplace. The words are ordinary, and they stand in their usual place. Figures of speech are not used. Yet the piece has a charm. The thoughts are homely; the expression is in perfect keeping; the style is clear, simple, direct, and natural. The closing sentence is slightly humorous. Benjamin Franklin trudging along the street, hugging a great roll of bread under each arm, and eating a third roll, must have been a laughable sight.

Have you ever known boys and girls in writing school compositions, or reporters in writing for the newspapers, to use large words for small ideas, and long, high-sounding phrases and sentences for plain, simple thoughts? Have you ever seen what could be neatly said in three or four lines “padded out” to fill a page of composition paper or a column in a newspaper?

When Franklin said. “My pockets were stuffed out with shirts and stockings,” he said a homely thing in a homely way; that is, he fitted the language to the thought. To fit the expression to the thought on every occasion is the perfection of style. If Franklin had been a weak, foolish writer, his sentence might have taken this form:—

“Not having been previously provided with a satchel or other receptacle for my personal effects, my pockets, which were employed as a substitute, were protruding conspicuously with extra underclothing.”

Compare this sentence with Franklin’s and point out the faults you see in the substitute. Can you find anything in the meaning of provided that makes previously unnecessary? Do you now understand what Lowell meant when, in praise of Dryden, he said, “His phrase is always a short cut to his sense”?

TO THE TEACHER.—What is here taught of the paragraph and of style will probably not be mastered at one reading. It will be found necessary to return to it occasionally, and to refer pupils to it for aid in their composition work.

SUGGESTIONS FOR COMPOSITION WORK.

TO THE TEACHER.—We suggest that the pupils reproduce from memory the extract above, and that other selections of narrative be found in the Readers or elsewhere and studied as above.

The pupils may be able to note to what extent the narrative follows the order of time and to what extent it is topical. They may also note the amount of description it contains. They should, so far as possible, find the topic for each paragraph, thus making an outline for a composition to be completed from reproduction.

It will now require little effort to write simple original narratives of real or imagined experiences.

 

*

 

Exercises on the Composition of the Sentence and the Paragraph.

FROM C. D. WARNER’S “MY SUMMER IN A GARDEN.”

1. In the driest days, my fountain became disabled; the pipe was stopped up. 2. A couple of plumbers, with the implements of their craft, came out to view the situation. 3. There was a good deal of difference of opinion about where the stoppage was. 4. I found the plumbers perfectly willing to sit down and talk about it—talk by the hour. 5. Some of their guesses and remarks were exceedingly ingenious; and their general observations on other subjects were excellent in their way, and could hardly have been better if they had been made by the job. 6. The work dragged a little—as it is apt to do by the hour.

1. The plumbers had occasion to make me several visits. 2. Sometimes they would find, upon arrival, that they had forgotten some indispensable tool; and one would go back to the shop, a mile and a half, after it; and his comrade would await his return with the most exemplary patience, and sit down and talk—always by the hour. 3. I do not know but it is a habit to have something wanted at the shop. 4. They seemed to me very good workmen, and always willing to stop, and talk about the job or anything else, when I went near them. 5. Nor had they any of that impetuous hurry that is said to be the bane of our American civilization. 6. To their credit be it said that I never observed anything of it in them. 7. They can afford to wait. 8. Two of them will sometimes wait nearly half a day, while a comrade goes for a tool. 9. They are patient and philosophical. 10. It is a great pleasure to meet such men. 11. One only wishes there was some work he could do for them by the hour.

+The Uses of Words and Groups of Words+.—How can you make the last part of 1 express more directly the cause of becoming disabled? Would you use a semicolon to separate the sentences thus joined, or would you use a comma? Give a reason for the comma after days, Find in 2 an adverb phrase that expresses purpose. Use an equivalent adjective in place of a couple of. Explain the use of there in 3. What adjective may be used in place of good in a good deal? What long complex phrase modifies deal? Put what after the preposition about and find a group of words that takes the place of a noun. Find in this group a subject and a predicate. Find in 4 an objective complement. Find a compound infinitive phrase and tell what it modifies. Notice that the dash helps to show the break made by repeating talk. When 5 is divided into two sentences, what word is dropped? This, then, must be the word that connected the two sentences. Notice that the two main parts of 5 are separated by a semicolon. This enables the writer to show that the two main divisions of 5 are more widely separated in meaning than are the parts of the second division where the comma is used. Give the three leading predicate verbs in 5 and their complements. If they had been made by the job is joined like an adverb to what verb? What is the predicate of this modifying group?

The infinitive phrase in 1, paragraph 2, modifies what? Is me, or visits, the object complement of make? Put what after would find in 2 and get the object complement. Can you make a sentence of this group? What are its principal parts? Does the writer make an unexpected turn after talk? How is this shown to the eye? Put what after do know in 3 and find the object complement. Can you make a sentence of this object complement? What phrase can you put in place of the pronoun it without changing the sense? By using the word it, a better arrangement can be made. What group of words in 5 is used like an adjective to modify hurry? Change the pronoun that to hurry and make a separate sentence of this group. What word, then, must have made an adjective of this sentence and joined it to hurry? What is the object complement of can afford in 7? Supply a preposition after will wait in 8, and then find two groups of words that tell the time of waiting. Find a subject and a predicate in the second group. What explains it in 10? Find the object complement of wishes in 11. What is the subject of was? The office of there? After work supply the pronoun that and tell the office of the group it introduces. What is the object complement of could do? What connects this group to work?

+The Grouping of Sentences into Paragraphs+.—There are two distinct sets of sentences in this selection—distinct because developing two distinct subtopics. Accordingly, there are two paragraphs. Let us take for the general topic The Visits of the Plumbers. Let us see whether all the sentences of the first paragraph will not come under the subtopic First Visit, and those of the second under the subtopic Subsequent Visits. The sentences of each paragraph should be closely related to one another and to the subtopic. They should stand in their proper order. Do the paragraphs above stand such tests? If they do, they possess the prime quality of +Unity+.

+The Author’s Style+.—This selection we may call +Narrative+, though there are descriptive touches in it. It is a story of what? Is the story clearly told throughout? If not, where is it obscure? Is it made interesting and entertaining? Is Mr. Warner here giving us a bit of his own experience? Or do you think he is drawing upon his imagination? Would you call the style plain, or does it abound with metaphors, similes, or other figures of speech? Are the sentences generally long, or generally short? What are the faults or foibles of these real or fancied plumbers? Does the author speak of them in a genial and lenient way? or is he hostile, and does he hold up their foibles to scorn and derision? Does he make us laugh with, or does he make us laugh at, the plumbers? If the former, the style is humorous; if the latter, the style is satirical or sarcastic. Would you call Mr. Warner’s quality of style +Humor+? or that +form of wit+ known as +Satire+? Is our author’s use of it delicate and refined? or is it gross and coarse? Does it stop short of making its object grotesque, or not? Can you name any writers whose humor or satire is coarse?

SUGGESTIONS FOB COMPOSITION WORK.

TO THE TEACHER.—See suggestions, pages 159, 160.

Exercises on the Composition of the Sentence and the Paragraph.

FROM BEECHER’S “LECTURES TO YOUNG MEN.”

1. Indolence inclines a man to rely upon others and not upon himself, to eat their bread and not his own. 2. His carelessness is somebody’s loss; his neglect is somebody’s downfall. 3. If he borrows, the article remains borrowed; if he begs and gets, it is as